We have compiled here a list of all products and online tools and resources that we find very useful to save electricity.
1.
The Owl Wireless Electricity Monitor:
We find this tool very helpful in tracking the complete electricity
usage of a house, apartment or building. You just need to hook it up to
the electricity line coming out from the meter or fusebox that the
electricity company installed for you. The Owl comes in 1-phase and
3-phase options, and the sensors that are included in the box are
simple clip ons that can be easily snapped around any cable line.
If you think your electricity cable is thick, you may want to
buy
the Large sensors, instead of the small ones. The sensors do
the
actual measuring, and then wirelessly communicate the data to the
monitor, shown in the image on the left. With the monitor, you can
track real time how much electricity your house is using, and have
better control on your bills. You can understand how my electricity
your individual appliances use by turning them on and off one by one,
to see their impact on the total reading. The Owl also saves
data
for up to a year, and
you can easily download it to your computer with a USB cable. The Owl
comes with its own analysis software, which you can install on your
computer to compare how your electricity usage changes by month to
month, day to day and hour to hour. Prepare to be amazed by the
discoveries you make about your electricity usage, especially when
looking at your monitor real time. Some of the discoveries we made was
that our water pump was using double its rated power consumption
because it was badly in need of servicing. Also, our kitchen exhaust
fan was using 4 times the electricity it should be using, and needed to
be replaced. For more information, check out the Full Specifications of the Owl.
Amazon has a really great deal selling it for $95 at the moment, which is 50%
off the retail price.
2.
If you would like to measure the amount of energy (or
electricity) that your individual plugged-in appliances use,
instantaneously or over a period of 24 hours, than the Kill A Watt meter
is for you. Plug in your appliance into the Kill A Watt, and then plug
your Kill A Watt into the socket. If you know the rate of electricity
you pay, you can also feed that into the meter to show you the amount
of money you have spent in 24 hours to run your appliance. There is
also tons of other useful information you can get, for instance what
voltage are you getting at that particular socket. Just switch through
the various modes to check it out. The Kill A Watt is only useful for
the US, since its operating voltage is 115V. You can buy it
for $27 on Amazon. For
versions that run on 220V, here are many good options on Amazon UK. We personally prefer
the Belkin Energy Saving monitor,
which allows you to plug in your meter even in obscure hard to reach
places, and then see your readings easily on a small wireless monitor.
It can also stand loads of over 3250 Watts.
3.
If you wish to measure the electricity an entire system uses, for
instance a desktop computer, a monitor and a printer, or your TV, cable
box and stereo system, then look no further than the Brennenstuhl Ecoline 5-way Plug Socket
Energy Monitor.
That may be a mouthful to say but it is very convenient if
you
wish to see, for instance, what load you have put on a single outlet.
And it is wonderful for systems with multiple electricity-guzzling
components. Similar to the other energy meters, you can see the
instantaneous and 24-hour usage of your systems, as well as learn the
current it uses, its power factor, etc.4. We have already mentioned several calculators you can use in different pages, but they are summarized here:
To calculate the correct size of AC you need for your room visit http://www.csgnetwork.com/acroomsizecalc.html
If you happen to reside in Australia or New Zealand, you can find the most energy efficient appliance for your needs at http://www.energyrating.gov.au/